


Republic City's Goin' Down Swingin'

by ang3lba3, Mellomailbox



Series: Baby Dragons and other founders of Republic City [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: (It's not), All In One Fic!, Ambassador Sokka, Breaking Up & Making Up, Cultural Differences, Dragons, Fire Lord Zuko, Getting Back Together, Getting Together, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Cheating, M/M, Making Republic City, Misunderstandings, Polyamory, Post canon, Post-Finale, Relationship Negotiation, Ursa is dead, Zuko the Dragon Dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-29
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:53:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23904937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ang3lba3/pseuds/ang3lba3, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mellomailbox/pseuds/Mellomailbox
Summary: In which: Sokka and Zuko get together, break up, make out, and then get back together. In that order.“So you guys spent five hours holed up working out thisfifth Nationplan after spending ten hours with the council?” Toph asks, digging at the wax in her ear with her pinky nail.“Yep,” Sokka says, straight faced. His heart is jackalope fast in his chest.“We’re dedicated civil servants,” Zuko grates out.
Relationships: Mentioned Suki/Sokka, Sokka/Zuko (Avatar)
Series: Baby Dragons and other founders of Republic City [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1721398
Comments: 38
Kudos: 326





	Republic City's Goin' Down Swingin'

**Author's Note:**

> We extended the timeline, so this is set roughly a year after the end of the war, which lasted 3 years in our canon. Sokka and Zuko are both 19/20.

“This isn’t working,” Zuko says for the thousandth time, dropping into a chair with a thick rasp of heavy robes. He rubs at the bridge of his nose, face drawn and pale from stress. 

Sokka shuts the doors to the newly christened tactical room. They close with a heavy thud, shutting them away from the prying eyes of the guards and giving Sokka a reprieve from their disapproving stares. 

Whatever. He’s Water Tribe, they’ve tried to kill each other before, get over it. 

“No shit,” he sighs. “The war did decades of damage, of course it’s not gonna be fixed in a few months.” 

“That is not what I mean and you know it,” Zuko snaps, the candles lining the walls flaring. For a second, Sokka thinks they’re actually going to talk about the elephant-giraffe in the room, the way Zuko looks at him when he thinks Sokka isn’t paying attention. The way Sokka looks at him when he knows Zuko _is_ paying attention.

“Oh?” Sokka says, doing his best to sound— coy, or sexy, or something. He leans against a wall, and then almost falls over when it’s one of those stupid folding screens instead.

Zuko doesn’t laugh, but he does stop rubbing at his face to watch Sokka flounder up, picking pieces of screen off of his clothes. 

“That was an antique,” Zuko says.

“Everything you own is an antique,” Sokka moans, kicking the frame aside. Zuko’s glower deepens. “You should declutter.” 

“You should be less clumsy,” Zuko says. The candles stay steady though, and the groove between his eyebrows has flattened out. Not by much, but by as much as it ever does.

Sokka sticks his tongue out and moves over to the table where the map of the four nations is still spread open, pieces knocked over the area christened “Returned Nation”. 

“So what’s not working? I know it’s not _us,_ because we do nothing _but_ work,” Sokka says. “Is it— no, don’t tell me it’s this shirt, I _love_ this shirt.”

He clutches at it like Zuko’s going to stand and rip it off his body. Which he won’t, probably. Damn it. It’s a good shirt though, and he knows that Zuko also thinks it’s a good shirt. Closely fitted, a light blue, sleeveless. He’d kept yawning in meetings today, just so that he could subtly flex while covering his mouth. 

“Your shirt is _indecent._ It’s transparent fabric scraps, not clothing. The Fire Nation might tolerate your indecency, _barely,_ but you— bought that shirt in the colonies. That’s the point, I think. The colonies aren’t Fire Nation, not really.” Zuko sighs and slouches further down the chair, head tipped back to stare at the ceiling. “Isn’t trying to force the Fire Nation on people the whole reason we’re in this mess?” 

“Tell that to the Earth Kingdom citizens who got their farms, their land, their--” 

“--I know!” Zuko says, throwing his hands up. “You’ve said, everyone’s _said_. But that was a hundred years ago, they’re not the same people anymore. And don’t say it’s because the Fire Nation killed all the old people!” 

“They did,” Sokka says, just to feel the heat of a candle brush his forearm. 

“TIME KILLED THEM!” Zuko roars. The candles flicker, gutter as he takes one gulp of air after another, trying to calm himself.

Sokka grins and watches. “Sounds like a copout.”

“You’re a copout,” Zuko hisses, and puts his face in his hands. It’s good for him to lose his temper every once in a while, when it’s just them. And it’s _easy_ to bait him. And for some reason— he lets himself be baited. When it’s just them.

Sokka mimes being stabbed in the heart, wiggling his fingers to mimic the spray of blood and falling against the table. “Brutal,” he moans, “fucking brutal, man.” 

“Sokka, I’m serious,” Zuko says, and brings his face up, dragging his hands hard over his face. 

“Hi serious,” Sokka starts, and Zuko throws a bobble at him. He dodges, and keeps talking. “Ignoring the Earth Kingdom’s right to their land, what about the Fire Nation? If we let them stay, wouldn’t they feel like they’d been invaded during your rule? That land has belonged to you for a _hundred years_ , and you can’t tell me that it’s not important.” 

“No, I can’t.” Zuko stares at his hands, pops a flame from fingertip to fingertip. “The Earth Kingdom can’t take the land entirely. The economy’s already collapsing without the population needed to maintain it, and the tensions are growing with mixed citizens as they’re forced to choose which half of their family to claim. The Fire Nation can’t retain sovereignty, but I also can’t allow my people to stay just so they can become second class citizens in their homes. _No one can win this._ ”

“It’s not about _winning_ , hotshot, it’s about _compromise._ ” Sokka points out. Then he wrinkles his nose. “I sound like Aang.”

“You sound like Aang,” Zuko agrees. Then, eyes widening, “Sokka, you _sound like Aang.”_

“If only you could look that impressed every time I’m right about something,” Sokka jokes.

Zuko shoots to his feet, then across the room, grabbing Sokka by the forearms. His eyes are bright, mouth smiling, foreign expressions lately. “Sokka. You sound like _Aang._ ”

Sokka flicks Zuko onthe forehead. “I think you’re broken.” 

Zuko shakes him a little, but doesn’t dispute it, just seems too excited to stay standing still. “The Avatar! Four elements, living in unison!”

“....Yeah?” Sokka says, slow, leaning closing to get a look at Zuko’s pupils in the event something was slipped into his tea earlier. He smells like smoke and spice, and Sokka steps into the warmth radiating from his robes. 

“No _one_ can win, Sokka. But—” Zuko blinks, seeming to realize how close they are. He looks down at his own hands, where they wrap around Sokka’s arms, and flushes dully, drops them, steps away. He coughs into his hand, looks away. “I apologize. I was overexcited.”

Sokka steps back into Zuko’s space and grabs him by the shoulders. “You’re not overexcited, you’re a genius! We create a _fifth_ Nation! An Avatar!” He shakes him, giddy, face burning with how huge he’s grinning.

“Yes!” Zuko whoops, and turns to kiss Sokka just as Sokka’s grabbing his face in his hands to kiss him first. “Mmph!... _mmm._ ”

Sokka pulls back, still holding Zuko’s face, eyes wide. He’s still grinning, knows he looks manic but he doesn’t care. “You should be a genius more often,” he says, flexing his fingers against Zuko’s heated skin. 

“I… should? I should.” Zuko nods, fingers caught in the hem of Sokka’s indecent shirt. “I really should.”

“Here, I’ll show you how,” Sokka tells him, leaning back in to seal their lips together, hands grasping his face, his neck, fingers dipping beneath the neck of his robe. 

There’s a knock at the door, and they spring apart, breathing hard and dishevelled. They just stare at each other for a moment, and the knock comes again. Zuko sits down at the table, and Sokka splays himself naturally against the wall by the broken screen, finger guns at the ready.

“Come in,” Zuko says, voice rough. He’s trying to remember how he sits when he hasn’t just been kissed. He cannot remember how he does _anything_ that isn’t kissing Sokka. 

“Fire Lord Zuko, Ambassador, apologies for the interruption,” a servant says, her head bowed. In her hands is a tray of food. Dinner. Dinner that they’d ordered before they came in here. _Right._

“On the table is fine, thank you,” Zuko says, and she lays it out quickly.

Sokka is staring at him, eyes hot, finger guns frozen in mid air. Zuko prays to Agni that the servant doesn’t look up long enough to offer to clean up the screen. He can’t think of a reason why he’d say no, and if this lasts much longer he’s going to _die._ Luckily, when she spots it, she merely hurries out, eyes wide. 

“It looks like you threw me through the screen in a fit of tantrum,” Sokka says when the servant leaves, already descending on the food. He shoves something grilled into his mouth and smirks at him, talking with his mouth full. “Fire Lord Zuko and his temper are all they’re gonna talk about.” 

“It does _not_ look like that,” Zuko protests, and then remembers the panicked whites of her eyes, the sudden tremble in her hands. He sets his head on the table, and then picks it up and drops it again. “Fuck.”

“Ha-ha,” Sokka teases, dragging a chair over to him and sitting a platter on his lap. 

“There’s more than one screen in this room,” Zuko threatens.

“Hot,” Sokka’s mouth says. His brain screams once it catches up.

Zuko feels himself startle, face turn red again. Maybe not— throwing _Sokka_ through one. But the idea has… potential.

“If we don’t makeout right now I don’t think we’re gonna be able to keep talking strategy,” Sokka blurts. He’s staring at Zuko’s mouth where he’s been chewing his bottom lip in thought. It’s red and shiny and puffy and utterly, utterly kissable. 

“We could talk makeout strategy,” Zuko says, instead of knocking all the dishes on the floor and pushing Sokka onto the table like he wants to. Self restraint is an important trait to develop in a Fire Lord.

“Good thing I’m the plan guy,” Sokka says, hooking a hand on the collar of Zuko’s robe and dragging him over. Zuko makes a sound that Sokka likes _a lot._

“I’m better at taking orders anyways,” Zuko breathes, and then tries to cringe into his own spinal cord when Sokka grins wolfishly. “No, don’t, I take it back,” he tries, but Sokka’s too far gone to be stopped. 

“First order,” Sokka says, and puts his mouth against the soft part of Zuko’s neck. Which is all of it, really. “No takebacks.”

And then he finds out what kind of noises Zuko makes when he uses his teeth.

***

“So you guys spent five hours holed up working out this _fifth Nation_ plan after spending ten hours with the council?” Toph asks, digging at the wax in her ear with her pinky nail. 

“Yep,” Sokka says, straight faced. His heart is jackalope fast in his chest.

“We’re dedicated civil servants,” Zuko grates out. His fingers keep twitching to his high collar, fiddling with the buttons.

“Uh-huh.” Toph doesn’t sound impressed, but she’s not looking at them weird or anything. Sokka’s heartbeat doesn’t slow. 

“So, yeah, we should work out the specifics so we can--”

“Five hours wasn’t enough for the specifics?” She pushes, flicking some wax at Sokka. He makes a face and dodges, kicking at her ankle uselessly. 

“I have to,” Zuko starts, and then stops, and then leaves the room.

“Well _that_ sounded vital and time sensitive and official, I should go help him,” Sokka says, darting after him.

“Cool,” Toph calls after them, moving on to picking at her toenails, “have fun making out with the Fire Lord. Definitely won’t cause any riots or anything!” 

This wing of the building is empty. She isn’t kidding about the riots.

“I’m going to pee!” Zuko yells back at her. 

“Thanks for telling me! You have my permission, shits for brains!” Toph yells. 

“I’ll just help with that, shall I?” Sokka says in a snooty accent, far enough away that he probably thinks Toph can’t hear him anymore. He always forgets how _good_ her hearing is.

“ _Yuck_ ,” Toph yelps, and sends out a slab of stone to block the door and hopefully her ears from hearing anything else that’s going on. She can’t stop her feet from seeing them though, pressed together halfway down the hallway, hearts pounding. 

She stomps over to the nearest couch, and kicks her feet up.

***

“Toph isn’t wrong,” Zuko says some weeks later. They’re lying on Zuko’s bed, on their backs, sweat cooling on tacky skin as the moon glares accusingly at him through the window. There’s a letter from Suki waiting for Sokka in his room, all communications passed through Zuko’s security team first. He hasn’t had the heart to tell Sokka that Mai’s been reading his mail. 

“‘Bout wha?” Sokka asks, hands thrown over his head and lashes fluttering as he struggles not to fall asleep. He’s cute, face relaxed and wolftail loose, sweat-damp hair sticking to his forehead. Zuko scoots closer and kicks at Sokka’s foot. 

“Wake up, this is important.” 

“But not more important than riding me like a beaver-horse?” Sokka slurs, heaving a sigh as he rolls over to his side so that he can meet Zuko’s eyes. Unable to help himself, he reaches out to run his fingers through Zuko’s shaggy hair. It’s nearly to his shoulders now, and Sokka’s made no secret how much he likes it. 

“It’s… related?” Zuko tries. Sokka is instantly awake.

“You’re pregnant,” he says.

“What?! No!” Zuko pokes him in the ribs, and Sokka wiggles away, groaning petulantly.

“Then _what_. I’m tired. You’ve worked me half to death. I’m dying. This is my death bed, and you’re _waking me up_.”

“To talk about Toph,” Zuko agrees, unable to help egging Sokka’s melodrama on if it means avoiding the conversation he knows that they have to have. 

“TOPH IS PREGNANT?”

“Fertility crystals are surprisingly true to their name,” Zuko deadpans. “One unprotected bending session, and…”

“Katara’s gonna be so excited,” Sokka decides, playing with the lobe of Zuko’s unburned ear. 

“She’s named us the godpebbles.”

Sokka breaks, laughing, his head tipped against Zuko’s. “Fuck, who taught you how to be funny? I’m the funny guy in this outfit!”

“A genius,” Zuko says, grinning slyly. 

“Oh ho ho, keep stroking my ego and you might get to stroke something else, ehhhh?” Sokka croons, waggling his eyebrows. 

The smile drops, abruptly, and Zuko feels like he’s suffocating under the weight of everything he hasn’t said. Of everything he hasn’t asked, and that he’s assumed, but can’t _keep_ assuming, for his own sanity. He misses Sokka so much it feels like a crater in his chest, and he misses him worst when he’s right here.

“Woah,” Sokka says, propping up on his elbow and looking down at Zuko. He moves aside some sticky hair to get a better look at golden eyes, shifty and bright. He taps Zuko’s forehead. “What just happened in there, hotshot? You misplace your honor or something?” 

“Yes,” Zuko says, because that’s exactly what he’s done. He thought— “I thought that you just wanted to fuck. But you’re still… here. So. Yes. I’ve misplaced my honor.” 

Sokka’s eyes go wide, hurt, and he sits up and away, back against the headboard. “Ouch. Okay, I’m not gonna pretend that doesn’t sting. Honestly thought we had some mutual respect going on, but once a Water Tribe peasant always one, huh?” 

“Fuck you,” Zuko spits out, and sits up himself, pulling the sheet around his shoulders defensively. “The issue _is_ that I respect you. But I can’t show it, or they’ll rip us apart.”

“Who? Our friends? They know already, Zuko!” Sokka says, purposely obtuse.

“Our _friends_ don’t matter! I can’t— I can never take you as a consort. You know that. You _have_ to know that, you’re not actually stupid.”

Sokka’s angrily shoving his hair back into a tail, groping around for his leather thong. He finds Zuko’s silk tie and makes a disgusted sound, tossing it away and letting his hair fall. He wishes he’d pretended to be asleep. At least then he’d still be floating warmly along a post-fuck current, Zuko smoldering next him, relaxed for the blessed few moments that Sokka can give him. 

“I didn’t think that I mattered to you,” Zuko says in a small voice. “I’m sorry. I wouldn’t have—”

“You don’t know that!” Sokka snaps, defensive. “You don’t know how I _feel._ I have a girlfriend!” 

Zuko flinches deeper into his sheet, and his face straightens into a smooth, blank mask. “Of course,” he says in a stilted voice. “I don’t know what I was saying.”

“Obviously,” Sokka mutters, climbing out of the bed, feeling vulnerable and young. He pulls his clothes on quickly, shoulders tensed to the point of pain. 

Zuko pulls the sheet halfway over his head, like a cloak. “She knew about me though, right. I didn’t— you weren’t—”

Sokka freezes, which is all the tell that Zuko needs. 

“Right. Yeah. Why would she.” Zuko feels hollowed out. He doesn’t think Sokka would cheat on Suki, it’s why he’d never even asked. And he didn’t want to consider that Sokka would, that Zuko’s honor would demand he stop and make reparations to the injured party. Of course he didn’t tell Suki. Zuko wasn’t important enough to mention. 

“It’s not-- you’re making into something,” Sokka splutters, “we’re just warriors in the same tribe, or whatever. Helping each other out. That’s not-- I wasn’t--” He sucks in a sharp breath, because he hadn’t actually considered talking to Suki about Zuko, not once. Not out of some misguided attempt to maintain a lie, or anything, but out of lack of association. Why _would_ he talk to Suki about this? It’s his. 

“You were _helping me out,”_ Zuko says incredulously. “That’s what this has been to you? A— soldiers in the barracks, giving a hand?”

Sokka prickles at Zuko’s tone and finally turns to glare at him, pride like acid behind his eyes. “Even if it wasn’t, it’s not like it matters,” he relents, unable to fully lie. No matter how sour he feels, they’ve been through too much for that. 

“If?” Zuko asks, knuckles white as the sheet he’s clutching around himself.

Sokka laughs, incredulous. “What do you want me to say? That I _love_ you?” The words burn on their way out, catching on his teeth. He forces them past numb lips anyways. “We’re barely twenty! You’re, you’re the fucking _Fire Lord_ and I’m-- I’m _me._ We’re warriors, Zuko. We’re _not more._ ”

“I want you to leave,” Zuko says, trying not to think about what he’d wanted— he’d wanted Sokka to be his consort. He’d wanted to apologize, because it wasn’t possible. He’d wanted to find a way they could make a middle ground his honor would accept and Sokka would tolerate. Louder now, to hide the tears building in his throat, “I want you out of my _fucking rooms.”_

He pulls the sheet over his head entirely, lays down, back to Sokka. What’s he gonna do, stab him in it? Bit redundant. He’d wanted to know what Sokka would sound like saying _I love you_ to him. He should know better than to want for things, by now.

Sokka watches him, head pounding, eyes burning, heart painfully fast. He clenches his fists and swallows down all the things that he would say if it was Suki he’d just upset. It’s not Suki, after all, it’s _Zuko,_ the bane of his fucking existance for years, stubborn and dramatic and completely unlikable. 

_This was a terrible misunderstanding,_ Sokka wants to say. He opens his mouth, even, and Zuko curls up tighter under the sheet, as if waiting for a blow. His shoulders are shaking. Sokka sees his hair leather on the floor and picks it up numbly. 

He doesn’t say anything. He leaves, quietly, confused and aching, angry at himself and at Zuko. 

It was a terrible misunderstanding. He’s not sure what he misunderstood, or what Zuko misunderstood, but it doesn’t make any sense that either of them can be so hurt when neither of them care. 

Sokka’s just not sure he cares enough to fix it, either.

***

Sokka spends nearly a week in the Fire Palace library. He’s avoiding Zuko, waiting for the official request to appoint a new ambassador, but he’s also trying to learn. 

He misses Zuko. It’s been long enough that he can admit it. He wrote to Suki the second he was back in his rooms, out of a misguided attempt to prove Zuko wrong about whatever he was implying. 

Suki’s reply was confused at some points, and difficult to understand at others where it had gotten waterlogged on its way back to him. Something about Zuko’s name getting damaged on the way over, maybe? Either way, she hadn’t cared. In fact, it had made her concerned that her _own_ perfectly normal warrior-lady activities had been crossing a line.

Sokka didn’t feel better when he read that letter. If anything, it made him _more_ upset. Who does Zuko think he is, trying to twist something so easy into something _not?_

***

Zuko spends his week avoiding Sokka, and himself, whenever possible. Sokka makes it easy, by avoiding Zuko. The guards and the servants and the advisors and the other ambassadors tell him that Ambassador Sokka is in the library. 

Zuko does not want to know that Sokka is in the library. Now all he wants to do is go to the library, for an entirely unrelated reason, which is— books. Scrolls. He _loves_ books and scrolls.

Clearly, drastic measures are necessary to keep him occupied and _away._

First, he puts himself in charge as the primary carer for the baby dragon that he’d received shortly after his coronation. He can’t take a baby dragon into a library, it’s distressingly flammable in there. And she’s far too loud for him to sneak around and spy on Sokka. 

After he has spent several days with her, he knows that this is bullshit. He could _absolutely_ sneak around with her and spy on someone. And the challenge of smothering her flames or directing them so that they don’t light anything up, all while disguising her sounds— he has to try it. 

_This isn’t even about Sokka,_ Zuko reassures himself as he crawls. Ursa is strapped to his back. She loves this game. It puts her to sleep every time. _This is about—_

He tries to think of what it’s about, and then starts removing books from the bottom shelf so that he can see Sokka’s shoes. He’d planned it right, so if he tilts his head just right, he can even see a bit of his calf. 

_This isn’t about Sokka,_ Zuko tells himself again. 

“Oh!” says a librarian, and trips over him. Zuko closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, then rolls to his feet. The librarian has glasses, which makes sense, and is wearing a soft looking cardigan over his robes. “F-”

Zuko waves his hand in a cutting motion. The librarian stops talking immediately. “I was just…” Zuko glances at the books he’d pulled out. “Help me check those out.”

“Certainly, certainly,” the librarian says, and falls to his knees almost gratefully. 

Zuko leaves the library with 28 books on infant care, relieved that Sokka hadn’t spotted him. The librarian had provided him with a book cart, and Ursa’s new favorite game is sleeping curled up on top of them. He takes the long route, and then a few extra turns, until he’s just walking in the abandoned corridors of the East Wing.

Sokka chases after him, sealskin shoes nearly silent against the marble flooring. He reaches for Zuko’s arm without thinking. “What are you doing here?” Sokka asks him, trying to parse the pile of books on Zuko’s cart before a flurry of anxious servants try and cart it away from him. There aren’t any servants here though, actually. It’s creepily empty, and Sokka hadn’t realized it had taken him so long to catch up.

“What am I doing in my palace?” Zuko asks, looking at Sokka’s hand on his arm, then looking back up and raising an eyebrow. 

Sokka looks pointedly at his hand where it remains on Zuko’s arm. He slides it up and under the sleeve of his robe, challenging, breathless with exhilaration. “Were you following me?” 

Zuko raises both eyebrows, but there’s a guilty twitch to his right eye. “Aren’t you the one who followed _me?”_

Sokka steps closer, pressing Zuko against the wall, hand still in his sleeve. 

“What are you doing,” Zuko says, but lets himself be moved, liquid under Sokka’s hands. Gods, he’s so easy, it makes Sokka want to— 

“Having a snack. What does it look like?” He dips his face, lips a breath away from Zuko, smoke and spice and heat. He licks his lips.

“Sokka,” Zuko says, but it’s not the beginning of a sentence. His voice is raw, his eyes slipping closed even as he trains them on Sokka’s lips.

 _This is a bad idea,_ Zuko thinks. _I didn’t go there to see Sokka._

A much more persuasive part of Zuko thinks, _shut the fuck up, you pathetic idiot._

This probably isn’t an apology. This probably isn’t anything, to Sokka. He’s made that abundantly clear. And Zuko’s— he quickly cycles through the rules on intimate encounters, looking for loopholes. After a certain length of time, the liaison must either come to an end or be formalized. They’re past that length of time, of course. That’s what he’d been trying to talk to Sokka about. If their liaison is to continue, one or both of them must take the dishonor on themselves for trivializing something as sacred as courting. 

If anyone finds out, they will assume that Sokka is the dishonorable one. The Fire Lord, _Zuko,_ would never take that on himself. And to share it equally? No. Sokka doesn’t even understand what’s dishonorable about this, he’s made that clear.

It’s a surprisingly easy choice, for one that makes him feel so utterly _wretched._

Zuko pushes Sokka away, hard, two hands at his bulky chest. It makes him stumble, and something like hurt or irritation flashes across his eyes. But there’s no keeping a secret like this, especially not if Sokka _corners him in public halls._

“We’re warriors, Sokka,” Zuko says stiffly, echoing what Sokka had said before he left Zuko’s room last time. No, not last time, for the _last_ time. “Unless you want to spar, I don’t see why you need to be that close to me.”

“What,” Sokka says, frowning harder as Zuko shoves away. “You’re the one who came to find me,” he accuses. There’s no conviction in his voice, though, resignation in the way that he takes a few additional steps back. 

“I came to find _books,_ ” Zuko lies, badly, and then to make up for it points at the cart full of proof. Ursa blinks at him drowsily, and then settles back in. “Is it my fault that you’re where _books are?”_

Sokka sets his jaw and turns away, storming back towards the ambassador's quarters. 

“Enjoy BOOKS!” Zuko screams after him. He’s shaking with pent up feeling, and he wishes he’d had something better to scream. 

*** 

Sokka should have rights to the Moon, he thinks. Sure, it’s Zuko’s palace and his turtle-duck pond he shared with him mom, whatever. He can have it during the day, and Sokka should get to dip his feet in the cool water and watch the way that the Moon’s reflection ripples and changes shape. He feels comforted in the pale glow of its light, a mirror of what Katara feels. 

“I miss you,” Sokka tells the reflection. Looking directly at her is too much for him, most nights. “I know it’s not fair, since we didn’t know each other long, but I do.” He rubs his thumb over a pebble, smooth and damp, and flicks his wrist to send it skipping across the surface. The image shivers again, and Sokka’s heart leaps for a moment before the figure behind him solidifies into a familiar shape. 

Zuko looks wretched. He’s in his sleeping robes, dark circles under his eyes, hair lank and tangled. He’s clutching at his arms, shivering in the humid evening, and he scowls when he sees Sokka. 

“Shit,” Zuko says flatly.

“I heard about your mom,” Sokka says dumbly. The gardens are already filled back in, but there are no secrets in the Palace.

“Yes. Well. I guess me and Katara finally have something in common,” Zuko says, and sits down at the bank beside Sokka. Not closely, but within arms reach.

“She was my mom too, y’know,’ Sokka says, an old pain eating away at him. Katara doesn’t remember that Sokka’s _older_ than her, _knew_ their mom in a way that Katara never did. 

“We already have things in common,” Zuko says, waving a hand dismissively. “Penises. Etcetera.”

Sokka laughs, startled out of his melancholy by Zuko saying the word ‘penis.’ A shadow of a smile crosses Zuko’s face, but he tilts his head away too quickly for Sokka to get a good look at it.

“Such language,” he teases, holding his nose to give it a nasally pitch like a specific advisor that they both can’t stand. 

Zuko’s shoulders shake, and at first Sokka worries he’s started crying, but then Zuko says, “Sooooooch laaaahnnnnnguuuuuuuoooooooge.”

Sokka’s reaching for him before he realizes, pulling him against his chest by a hand at his neck. Zuko’s giggles _do_ turn to sobs, then, shoulders shaking and fingers clutching at the back of Sokka’s shirt. 

“Azula _always lies,”_ he sobs. 

“Sometimes the truth hurts more,” Sokka says softly.

He lets Zuko cry in silence, then, petting his hair like he did Katara, after. It’s familiar, feeling someone’s last hope shatter beneath his hands. Sokka holds him tighter, warmed by the light of the moon. 

“Why are you helping me,” Zuko chokes out. It sounds like Zuko-typical dramatics, and Sokka— is honestly not in the mood. He’s not sure he could say anything that would make sense to him, anyways.

“I wonder if our moms are friends in the Spirit World,” Sokka muses. “They’d have to be, right? I mean, look at what we’ve done! They’re probably crowned Best Moms Ever down there. Up there? Sideways there?” 

“Slantwise,” Zuko says, and then blows his nose in Sokka’s shirt.

“Hey!”

“It’s practically fucking tissue paper already,” Zuko says, and wiggles the thin silk material demonstratively.

“Oh, gods, you and my shirts should run away together,” Sokka sighs. Zuko looks up at him, lashes damp and glittering the starlight, and there’s a moment of breathlessness that they share.

“My mom’s dead,” Zuko says, an odd look on his face, but before Sokka can tell what it is he’s kissing him.

Sokka kisses back, of course, feeling a little vulnerable in front of Yue but unable to stop himself. He licks into Zuko’s mouth, pushing him onto his back in the soft foliage by the pond. He kisses him like adoration, cherishing each slide of their lips and stroking gently at the side of Zuko’s tearstained cheek. 

Zuko whines underneath him, catches his hands in the thin material of Sokka’s shirt, rucks it up to grip at his back. His fingernails have grown out, the stately hands of a nobleman instead of a teenager on the run. They dig into Sokka’s skin, and Sokka winces. 

“Hey, whoa, easy,” Sokka says, breaking away for breath. Their chests brush with each gasp. 

Zuko stares up at him wildly, and then he’s wriggling out and away from Sokka’s arms. He stumbles to his feet, robe gaping open at the neck. He stares down at Sokka, and he looks _sick._

“That was— she’s been dead for years. This was _stupid_.” 

And then he sprints away into the palace.

Sokka stares after him, and then flops onto his back. He tries not to look at the moon, but his eyes keep going back to it. 

“Yeah, what the _fuck,_ right?” he asks Yue explosively, throwing his arms up.

*** 

“It’s a warrior thing,” Sokka tells Zuko once he’s finally cornered him in his rooms. He had to wait until Akiro came back from medical leave to relieve his replacement guard. Zuko didn’t have time to tell him that Sokka’s free reign had been rescinded, and here he is, slipping through familiar ornate doors to see Zuko’s head shoot up, covered in soot, his bangs singed. 

Yeah, Zuko didn’t have _time._ It’s not that he kept starting the sentence, choking up, and having to quick march his way out of the situation before he started crying in front of a temporary guard. 

“Kra!” Yells the baby dragon in Zuko’s lap, another puff of coal-dark smoke whispering from between leathery, red jaws. It probably has a name now, actually. 

“I’m _busy,”_ Zuko snarls. The dragon stares up at Zuko, wide eyed, and then lets out a disturbingly human wail. Zuko glares at Sokka, and picks the dragon up like an infant, rocking it back and forth close to his chest. “Look what you fucking did!”

“What!” Sokka splutters, staring at the beast in Zuko’s arms. “What is that doing indoors!” It shrieks louder at him, matching his tone, and Zuko curses when a talon digs into his arm deep enough to draw blood. 

“It’s okay Ursa, it’s okay, you’re okay, the mean _peasant_ can’t get you,” Zuko croons, attempting to murder Sokka with his eyes alone. “There’s a good dragonlet, there you are, it’s _Ursa!_ Yes she is! She _is_ good!”

The dragon. _Giggles._

“Cover her ears,” Sokka says nonsensically. 

“It’s important for her to develop a strong vocabulary in her first year of life,” Zuko says, looking appalled at the suggestion. 

For a wild moment Sokka wonders if it had just… slipped their collective minds that firebenders are actually born dragons. The way that Zuko’s holding it, supporting it’s bottom as its tail thrashes around angrily, eyes keen and focused on Sokka really gives it an air of intelligence that Sokka doesn’t want to contemplate. 

“They don’t talk,” Sokka says like a question. 

“And Toph doesn’t see, so she doesn’t like,” Zuko shakes his head. “No, that metaphor isn’t going to work. They do talk. Just not to the _Water tribe._ And not if they don’t get a formative vocabulary! _”_

“I’m telling her that you compared her to an animal,” Sokka teases, forgetting, for a moment. 

“Tell her I called you a rat-pig, that’ll ease the blow,” Zuko says. “Why the fuck are you here?”

Tension stiffens through him again, acid eating at his throat. Oh, right. _This_ is happening. Sokka straightens and juts out his chin proudly, shaking the letter in the air between them accusingly. “Suki says Warriors do this all the time where she’s from, too,” he accuses. 

“Sounds fun for warriors,” Zuko says, and pats Ursa’s back a little. She hiccups a flame that stops just short of his chin. He doesn’t even flinch. “It’s nice to know that you have so much in common with your girlfriend. Thanks for coming here, after I told you not to come here, to tell me that you’re both _sluts._ ”

“Excuse _me_ ,” Sokka snaps, fists clenched at his sides, crumpling the paper in the process. “Do not _ever_ talk about Suki that way!” 

“I’m sorry, that was insensitive of me. You’re the slut,” Zuko says, not looking very sorry. “Which is what we call it in the Fire Nation, when people sleep with whoever’s _conveniently nearby.”_

“Argh!” Sokka shouts, mostly because even though Zuko’s being a _cocksucker_ , he’s also making sense. He’d been reading up on Fire Nation customs, after all. Specifically the dating ones. 

He throws the letter to the ground and punches through another screen, feeling very Zuko-like for a moment. It’s gratifying, seeing something come apart via his fury, and he kinda understands the guy a little better. 

“That was a favorite of Azula’s,” Zuko says. “Good choice.”

“You were never convenient,” Sokka grinds out. He’s clawing at his fingers, digging into his cuticles until they bleed, refusing to look at Zuko. 

“Agni forbid I be even _that_ much to you,” Zuko snarls, and Sokka shouts right back. 

“Shut up! Shut up, you condescending cock-flamingo! We don’t do _convenient_ , we do _trust._ I _trusted you.”_ He lowers his voice, smearing blood around his knuckles. Ugh, he hates talking about this stuff. “I trust you. That’s why.” 

Zuko looks like he wants to dive out the nearest window. He twitches to stand, and Ursa snaps at his shirt front with discontent, only settling down when he stops moving. “I don’t understand the point of this conversation,” he admits.

Sokka crosses his arms, face reddening. “Any Fire Nation Noble has to consort with someone of equal social status or higher. In the event that the Noble is a Lord, they are allowed to choose a consort of any nobility that is of Fire Nation heritage of at least five generations,” Sokka quotes. 

Zuko stops meeting his eyes. 

“Earth Kingdom nobles take consorts that are not recognized by the oligarchy the same way as the Fire Nation,” Sokka continues, before Zuko interrupts him vehemently. 

“They take _whores,”_ Zuko spits. “Is that what you want? Is that what you want to be to me? Because I don’t want that.”

That startles Sokka, eyebrows raising in surprise. “I thought you cared if your people respected you. Look, I understand that you can’t change _everything._ That you might not even want to.” 

“Oh, yeah, because my life is about what I _want,”_ Zuko says, rolling his eyes. “But this part, this _very small part,_ can be. I will not dishonor you.”

Something passes across Sokka’s face, indiscernible even to himself. Whatever it is flushes through him like shame, and anger, and admiration. He approaches Zuko, gets right in his face, doesn’t flinch when Ursa bites down on his forearm in the process beyond shaking her off. “What _do_ you want, Zuko?” 

“I wanted you to dump me?” Zuko says, voice shaking. “I didn’t think— _you_ weren’t supposed to want anything.” 

“I. Didn’t.” Sokka bites out. “Things were _fine_ , Zuko, they were _good._ ”

“They were still happening! It’s not—” Zuko closes his eyes stubbornly. “There are rules, on how long a fling can last, before it has to end or it has to get serious. And I was _trying_ to tell you that it—” 

“I’m important,” Sokka interrupts. “To you, I mean. You said, you said you won’t dishonor _me._ Not yourself.” 

Zuko’s eyes open, the better to express sarcasm. “Oh no, you’re nothing to me, that’s why I said I respect you and that’s why we had to stop.”

Gods, it’s like pulling teeth from a fucking snake. Sokka hefts Ursa with two hands under her arms, and she doesn’t lash out either out of surprise or admiration at his handling, just grumbles a little and singes Zuko’s upholstery when Sokka sets her in the... dear gods... nearby bassinette. 

“You can’t just take my baby from me!” Zuko hisses quietly, trying not to wake her, and then corrects, “My dragon! My baby dragon!”

“Yeah, we’ll unpack that later,” Sokka drawls, and gets on his knees in front of Zuko. He places his palms on his thighs and stares him down. 

Zuko attempts to crab walk away. Sokka pushes harder, until he loses his balance and sits heavily against the carpet.

“You like me. No, shut up, you know what I mean. You want to-- to _date_ me, don’t you? Like, boys and girls.” 

Zuko’s face is red with humiliation, and his eyes are bright. “This is what you came here for? Really? I think you made yourself clear last time, don’t you?”

“I lied!” Sokka says, “You complete ass!”

“Why would you lie to me?! You have nothing to lose! You guessed what I wanted, and then when I confirmed it by fucking— crying like a baby— you left!”

“I was confused! And worried! I was under the impression that we were just _doing what warriors do_ , and I hadn’t thought about it-- and then you go all, ‘can’t be seen with the likes of you’, like really? That bullshit again?”

“Multicultural relationships are really frustrating and this fifth nation is never going to work!” Zuko yells at the ceiling. 

Sokka stops, brows furrowing in concern. His voice is gentle. “You were crying?” 

“Noooo,” Zuko says. “I loooove hiding my entire body under blankets and then turning my back on someone angry at me. It’s my faaavorite thiiiiing.”

Sokka leans back on his heel, frowning. He’s got his thinking face on, and he stares at nothing by Zuko’s hand. 

“Yes, I was fucking crying,” Zuko snaps. “That talk went really fucking badly. I was just trying to— work things out, get a third option we could both live with, and then you’re surprised I want you to love me and talking about me like some kind of masturbation aid.”

“Hm. I’m pretty stupid,” Sokka decides, looking back at Zuko. 

“And I’m bad at talking about my feelings!” Zuko says. 

“I didn’t know there were feelings,” Sokka admits. 

“That has become obvious!” Zuko’s hyperventilating a little, and he slams his mouth shut, breathes through his nose. 

Sokka scratches awkwardly at the beard he’s been trying to grow. “So, in the Water Tribe,” he starts casually, “I grew up with lots of people in the same hut. So it was me, and Katara, and our Mom and Dad and… Bato. Dad’s. _Special_ friend _._ ” 

The whites are showing in Zuko’s eyes. “What does that mean,” he wheezes out.

“It means that we don’t talk about it. We don’t fucking, name it, or make rules or whatever. It just _is._ ”

“Why would you not make rules for things,” Zuko says, sounding even more panicked at the idea of a society without protocol for every situation.

“Because it complicates things! Mom and Dad were married, and also there was Uncle Bato, and if we made _rules_ then maybe Mom and Dad wouldn’t have been married, or Bato would have been weird around Mom, or whatever. Rules make things worse sometimes.” Sokka explains loudly. 

“Instead of going into the marriage expecting that either or both of them would take same gender consorts,” Zuko says slowly. “They instead pretended that your father’s consort wasn’t his consort, because if they acknowledged it, your mother would feel slighted?”

“Yes!”

“That’s fucking insane.”

“YOU’RE FUCKING INSANE!” 

“Oh, _I’m_ insane because I don’t want to treat you like a dirty secret? Because I want to show you the respect and honor you deserve as someone who—” Zuko clamps his mouth shut again, crosses his arms defensively. 

He hasn’t even tried to move Sokka’s hands from his thighs. 

“So, I have feelings for you too. Thought that maybe now would be a good time to tell you.” Sokka decides.

“Which feelings,” Zuko says warily. “There are a lot of them.”

“Oh, you know. The usual.”

“Hatred?”

“Duh. You’re cute, though, so I’ll put up with it.” He tries on a lopsided smile, and Zuko’s temper flares. 

“Am I a fucking _joke_ to you?” he rips Sokka’s hands off his legs, pushes himself to his feet. 

“Everything is a joke to me,” Sokka tells him, standing, “You’re too serious all the time. I’m saying that I didn’t know there were feelings, and I was an ass and you were a drama cow-llama, and now I’ve realized that this is more a ‘Dad and Bato’ situation than a ‘hey lets give each other orgasms and make fart jokes’ situation.”

“I don’t make fart jokes,” Zuko says, but sits back down. He glances over at Ursa, but she’s fast asleep, molten snot bubbles rising on the exhale of every breath. “Huh. I guess that book was right.”

Sokka makes a face of confusion. 

“Infants can sense the mother’s distress,” Zuko says earnestly, and then blinks. “Or father’s. The person holding them. Their owner. The infant owner.”

“Unpacking that _later._ Preferably with Katara.” Sokka says again, trying to get a glimpse of the book covers around the room to see if there’s a dragon or a baby on them. 

“I’m a live-in Uncle who is secretly your father’s lover so as to not distress his wife situation, rather than a willing warm body you trust situation,” Zuko stares at the floor. “Is that better? It’s better for me, right?”

“Let’s get drunk,” Sokka says, a peace offering. 

Zuko face plants into Sokka’s collarbone, all the fight going out of him. “Please.”

*** 

The servants bring wine. They do not make a judgemental face at them, no matter what Zuko says.

“It’s 2 in the afternoon,” he grumbles, fucking with the cork but not actually popping it.

“And you’re the Fire Lord. A _young_ Fire Lord,” Sokka adds, taking the bottle and pulling the cork out with his teeth. He flexes a little as he does it. 

An expression of pure horror crosses Zuko’s face. “I’m a drunkard. This is the first step to becoming a drunkard, just like Fire Lord Minozu, deposed by his generals in the Hanging Tapestry Era—”

“For the love of Yue,” Sokka laughs, “I can’t understand half of what you’re saying, you drunk coot.” He hands him a dainty little cup brimming with red and downs a swig for himself directly from the porcelain bottle. 

“I’m going to be confined to a tower and defenestrated after levying unjust taxes,” Zuko says morosely, downs his cup, and then takes the bottle from Sokka’s hand and chugs.

“Toph told me a story about that once,” Sokka muses, taking the bottle back. “It was about a fierce earthbender with freakishly long hair. She was kept at the top of a tower to protect the world from her earthbending prowess. Something something, someone climbed up her hair to visit with her in her ivory tower.”

“Give me the bottle, I need to be drunker to ask you stuff,” Zuko says, and snatches for the bottle. Sokka holds it out of his reach, annoyed that his story recitation went ignored. 

“Stuff?”

Zuko pinks at the cheeks and the tips of his ears. “Things,” he bites out, holds out a hand demandingly.

A grin snakes over Sokka’s face. “Things.” He does not give him the bottle. 

“I’m trying to destroy the part of my brain that still has a self preservation instinct. I thought you would be helping me,” Zuko says.

“Make me,” Sokka taunts. 

Zuko makes a face at him. “I can’t _make_ you help me, what the fuck are you—”

“Oh no! You can’t reach the bottle!” Sokka says, and holds it over his own head. “You can’t reach it or take it from me!”

“I’m _taller_ than you,” Zuko says plainly, unimpressed. 

“But do you want it more?” Sokka says, standing and skipping a few steps back, grinning.

Zuko rolls to his own feet, stalking forward, hands down at his sides. Sokka backs up, keeps backing up until he’s pressed against the wall, and then goes on tippy toe.

“Sokka,” Zuko says. “Give me the bottle.”

Sokka wiggles his eyebrows. “Make me.” 

Zuko blushes, and his eyes go a little distant, lip between his teeth, before he seems to come to a decision. Sokka thrills at the hooded look Zuko lays on him, heat licking across his skin. 

“I’d rather ask,” he says primly, and tucks his hands into his sleeves. 

“Ask,” Sokka says.

“I can ask nicely,” Zuko mutters, shoulders hunching in awkwardly.

“Then ask me,” Sokka licks lips, “ _nicely._ ”

“Kay,” Zuko mumbles, and then shoves his fingers into Sokka’s armpits. Sokka shrieks, dropping the bottle, and Zuko snatches it out of the air, dancing away as he attempts to drink through his laughter.

“THAT’S NOT NICE!” Sokka whines, lunging for Zuko and missing. 

“I said,” Zuko gasps, coming up for air. “That I’d need to be more drunk before I could ask you _stuff_ and _things_. It’s not my fault you didn’t listen.”

“That’s a coppout!” Sokka says, and goes for him again. Zuko just barely makes it out of range this time, shaking with laughter.

“Stop it with your ninja swooshy nonsense!”

“Fine, next time I promise to ask nicely, I’ll give you the blowjob, happy?” Zuko giggles— _giggles_ — and then tries to find wine in an empty bottle.

“Huh. Only the good stuff for the Fire Lord?” Sokka asks, reaching for another one and pulling the cork out. He spits it aside and takes a few swallows. 

“I’m so anxious I think I might vomit,” Zuko says, and then howls with laughter. 

“Woah there, hotshot,” Sokka laughs, “wait for me!”

It’s not like it’s a surprise Zuko’s a lightweight. Or, well, it is, because Zuko refuses to drink most of the time. But Sokka knows from living in a Fire Nation colony for a while now that _generally_ speaking it’s easy to drink them under the table. Zuko chugging it, and his accelerated heart rate, had probably done a lot for him. And even more than that: the desire to be drunk can be more powerful than the drink.

So he steps forward and lays a hand on Zuko’s shoulder, trying for soothing, thumb tucking against his neck. 

“Heeey,” Zuko says, and presses his neck into Sokka’s thumb. Probably too hard, it doesn’t look comfortable, but Zuko’s voice just drops huskily. _“Hey.”_

“Hey,” Sokka answers, and steps closer, until their knees are brushing, breath mingling the scent of expensive wine.

“How much more do you need to drink?” Zuko asks, slipping his arms around Sokka’s waist. “Before copulation. Sex. Fucking. Love making?” He squints at Sokka’s shoulder, where the thin strap of his top has slipped. 

“Yikes,” Sokka says, tightening his arms when Zuko flinches and goes to pull away. “No, no, keep it up. What stuff and things did you wanna ask me?” 

“Do you want to have copulation sex fucking love making?” Zuko asks. “Uhhh what other words are there, hold on, I have—” he moves like he’s going to leave Sokka’s arms. “No, there’s a thesaurus in here, I can do this better.” And then, frantically. “I _can_ do this better, you’ll see, I promise.”

Sokka’s indulgent chuckling stops and he bumps their noses together, trying to catch Zuko’s eyes. “What the hell,” he says, “you don’t have to _do_ anything, you dummy.” 

Zuko meets Sokka’s eyes, frowning. “Uh. Yes I do. Obviously. And I have to do it better than before, whatever _it_ is in whatever sentence, and then—”

“You stubborn, self-sacrificing _moron_ ,” Sokka sighs, shaking his head. “This isn’t like learning to swordfight--” he stops, laughs at his own joke, “hah, well, y’know. You didn’t do anything wrong, and this better not be a trap to get me to say _I_ did anything wrong either.” 

“If no one did anything wrong, then there’s no way to make sure it _never happens again,”_ Zuko points out. “If you did something wrong, there’s still no way for _me_ to make sure it never happens again. I can only control my own behavior, and I need to adjust my behavior to improve the odds of the outcome I want most. It’s _exactly_ like sword fighting, except I probably won’t die if I fuck up.”

Sokka stares at him.

“You’re really fucked up, you know that?” 

“I did not _like_ ,” Zuko says, heatedly. “When I thought things were going to be— like that— forever. I did not _enjoy it,_ and I am going to _do better,_ and you can’t stop me from _trying to make you happy._ It’s entirely self-serving, I was miserable, happy yet? _”_

Sokka’s head is swimming. It could be from the wine, but just to be sure he takes another drink. “Which part?” He asks fuzzily. “The tongue in mouth part was miserable or the sleeping alone part?” 

“The part where I was letting you make _me_ the whorish dishonorable one but terrified that someone would find out and assume it was you and I’d have to make a public statement of some kind, all while my best friend would barely talk to me and didn’t understand why I was upset. That’s the miserable part.” 

“Yikes,” Sokka says again. “That’s rough. Glad we’re done with that.” He slips his hand between the folds of Zuko’s stupid robes and gropes him nonchalantly. 

“I’m still the whorish dishonorable one technically, it’s just easier to deal with when I know you—don’t mean it that way,” Zuko says, arching into Sokka’s hand. “Put the wine down.” 

“Ask nicely,” Sokka snickers, wrist moving beneath expensive silk. 

Zuko huffs out a laugh, and then his face goes deadly serious. “Okay,” he says, and somehow manages to drop to his knees without knocking Sokka over.

Sokka startles and drops the bottle. It shatters, red spreading in an explosive arc, splashing across their legs. 

Zuko stares at where his robes have been splattered and now soaked. Then he looks up at Sokka. Then he looks pointedly at where his hands are, just resting innocently on Sokka’s belt loops. Then he looks back up at Sokka. 

“It can’t get any more stained,” he says, even though that’s absolutely not true and he should be soaking these in his bath tub immediately. Like most things Sokka destroys, they’re antique. 

“Challenge accepted,” Sokka breathes, fingers threading through Zuko’s hair, long and soft and very, very pullable. “You got any gravy here? I can make a great mess with a little bit of gravy.” 

“I only want _your_ gravy,” Zuko says, trying for sexy and immediately regretting it. He starts fumbling with Sokka’s belt frantically as a distraction.

“HA!” Sokka laughs, legs wobbling and giving out as he falls to the floor. The seat of his pants immediately soak through from the shattered wine and he tips his head back against the wall. 

“You know Zuko, I think I’m really falling for you,” he deadpans. 

“This is a fucking disaster,” Zuko moans, burying his face in his hands.

Sokka shoves off the wall, wincing when a shard of porcelain presses into his skin through his clothes. “Alright, strip.” He doesn’t wait for Zuko to agree, pulling his tunic over his head and stumbling to his feet to shove out of his pants and red stained loincloth. He kicks them across the floor, dreading the letter to his tribe asking the leathermaker to sew him a new set. 

“Romance is dead,” Zuko says, pulling his robes off and dropping them on top of the wine bottle debris. He’s wearing a thin pair of pants and a thin tank top underneath, which he throws across the room to join Sokka’s clothing.

Sokka crouches, flexing his hands as he stares down Zuko where he’s wobbling. Or maybe that’s just his vision. He misses the wine. 

“What,” Zuko says, pulling his knees up to hide himself.

“Ha!” Sokka says again, and pounces, prepared for Zuko’s reflexes and blocking a knee to the gut. He tumbles them back onto the bed and straddles him, hands at his wrists, knees braced on either side of his hips. 

Zuko stares up at him, looking dazed. He presses his wrists against Sokka’s hands, just a little, and Sokka keeps his grip firm. “Caught ya.” 

Zuko shivers, and his eyes flutter shut, hips arching. “Okay,” he rasps out, and then lays perfectly still.

Sokka blushes, suddenly aware of them in a way he hadn’t before. Zuko’s scar, stark against pale skin. Sokka’s nudity in the opulent bedchamber of a palace, bedclothes nicer than anything he’d slept on in his last 18 years. Hell, he hadn’t had a _bed_ for most of it. 

Zuko’s eyes open, slowly, but his face stays open, trusting. He swallows, once, twice, then says, “You caught me. What are you going to do now that you have me?”

“Fuck if I know,” Sokka admits, and leans down to kiss him. 

That goes over well, at least, Zuko’s mouth wet and hot on his. His everything hot, actually. He’s burning up, Sokka’s hands stoking the fire with every grip and stroke and pull. He works their bodies together, shoving them back further on the bed to make room for rolling, writhing and grasping at sweat slick skin.

Zuko keeps ending up on the bottom, and Sokka thinks it’s an accident until he rolls them again, just to feel the weight of his body better. Zuko snarls in frustration, biting at Sokka’s shoulder, and flips them _again._

“Bet your advisors would call this treason,” Sokka gasps, hand between Zuko’s legs. Zuko keens and throws his head back, thighs spreading. 

“Bet my advisors can’t fuck worth shit,” Zuko manages.

“But there are _rules_ ,” Sokka teases. 

“Rule one is give the Fire Lord what he wants,” Zuko says, and his face is deadly serious. 

“Yeah?” Sokka asks, but it’s throatier now, his eyes dark with want. 

“To avoid treason,” Zuko says. “I think you had better fuck me.” Sokka does something with his wrist that leaves Zuko choking on a moan, feet kicking out underneath Sokka’s bulk. 

“Better write that down,” Sokka hums, sucking at Zuko’s neck beneath the edge of the burn scar as he holds him down. 

“I’m illiterate, don’t tell anyo- _ah!”_

“That knowledge stays with me and the Owl Spirit,” Sokka gasps, shoving against Zuko, into him, feet scrabbling on the silk for purchase. 

“In, in, _in,”_ Zuko demands.

“Your sheets are—” Sokka slips again, loses an inch. “Gods damn it!”

“I’m outlawing SILK,” Zuko yells. 

“Good— shit, how is this so _hard—_ ” 

“Ha--wait, like that--” 

“--Yeah I got it--”

“Get it _harder—”_

“Yes, your Lordliness,” Sokka breathes, his laugh choking on a moan when Zuko’s nails dig lines down his back. 

Zuko’s arching his back, driving back into Sokka with every thrust. Their bodies are slick with sweat, and the sheets are still being real _bastards,_ but Sokka can tell by Zuko’s breathing that he’s getting close. He’s been close since, oh, immediately, so that’s reassuring.

“Zuko,” Sokka says, simply to feel the name in his mouth. He can feel other things in his mouth, too, and he sucks on Zuko’s tongue, wet and messy. 

“Do you like dirty talk?” Zuko breaks the kiss to ask. “I’m very bad at it. Do you need me to try it? The books said—”

“Do I,” Sokka starts, stutters his breath as he rolls his hips more insistently. “You’re the only person I’ve ever--”

“I think they were racist books,” Zuko’s face is tensed up with pleasure, which is only making the conversation more incongruous. “It’s probably a bad idea. Wait, only person ever what?”

“Shut up,” Sokka groans, pleasure rushing through him, the impeccable Fire Lord furniture silent, leaving the rough, hushed breathing to echo through the room.

“This is unrelated to what you just implied,” Zuko announces in a very calm voice, and then shakes apart under him. He clutches at Sokka as he does, legs pressing against his sides, nails leaving marks against Sokka’s skin. 

“Shut _up_ ,” Sokka says again, hips working faster, faster, until the breath is punched out of him and he tumbles along with Zuko, forehead pressed against his collarbone painfully. 

There’s so much breathing. He’s sucking in deep breaths, Zuko doing the same underneath him, against sweaty skin and sticky hair. He can feel Zuko’s heart racing underneath him, and his own heart isn’t doing much better.

“You’re heavy,” Zuko mumbles, and Sokka goes to roll off of him but Zuko latches on more tightly, holding him in place. Sokka’s the stronger of the two and could easily break his embrace, but instead goes limp on top of him and buries his face against the side of Zuko’s neck. 

“Breathing’s for commoners.”

“You’re really assimilating quickly to being royalty again, huh?” Sokka says. He can feel Zuko’s pulse against his mouth and he kisses it, smiling when he feels the way it tics up. 

“Implies I was ever used to it in the first place, but sure,” Zuko says. 

“Why’d you assume I would like dirty talk?” Sokka asks him. 

“Kato in The Waterbender’s Stolen Bride of Fire liked it,” Zuko says through a yawn.

“Spirits,” Sokka mutters. “You’re such a girl.” 

“I was researching. Doing research. There’s not a lot of academic literature, though. Or any.”

“Just racist romance novels,” Sokka surmises. He kicks his feet a little, trying to get some of the stupid silk up and over them. He’s bringing his furs in this terrible bed as soon as he can. 

“Is saying ‘please fuck me with your thick tribal cock Kato, please, I need your seed to fill me up and breed me with a dozen penguin-seals’-- oh, he’s a shapeshifting penuin-seal, that’s important— ‘I want to have your eggs, fuck me oh Kato husband—” 

“Yep,” Sokka confirms. “Super racist. Do you still have it? I wanna send it to Katara and Aang, that’ll be a fun experiment.”

“I have the entire series. She wrote one where the Avatar could only be defeated with a purifying Fire vagina. It was banned and burned, of course, but my Mother rather liked romances. I think that’s why they still had a copy.”

Sokka props himself up on his elbow and gives Zuko a look. “No wonder you guys all hate us, with the way you write about other people. Xenophobic assholes.” 

“Let’s just say that it’s a good thing I was three years exiled before we met,” Zuko says, and covers his face with his arm. “Lots of time to start to change a kid’s mind.”

Sokka kisses the soft skin of the underside right over a blade scar. “So you’re saying we need to write wholesome, inclusive and culturally accurate romance novels in order to bring harmony to the four--” Sokka sits up, suddenly, staring excitedly down at Zuko. 

“Don’t be absurd, Sokka, no one will read them if they’re _wholesome._ We need to write an interracial gangba—” 

“No, listen, shut up,” he smacks at Zuko’s chest and face. “Listen! We can bring more cultural understanding of other nations through _novels_!” He makes a face and stares off into the distance. “Ugh, Katara was right, reading _is_ important to being a warrior.” 

Zuko takes his arm off his eyes. “That’s actually not a bad idea. Basic propaganda is going to be important, but if we don’t get popular creators involved it will never spread the same way.” 

“Also, propaganda is so obvious. This is sneakier, like the Dai Li but good.” Sokka adds. 

“Do I have to write it?” Zuko wonders at the ceiling. “I really don’t think I’m cut out for that, Sokka.”

“Wonder what the Ember Island Players are up to?” Sokka muses, absently thumbing at Zuko’s nipple. 

“I will throw you out of my rooms, dick first, if you _ever_ say that in my bed again,” Zuko says, and pulls a pillow over his face. 

“You have to admit their Toph was _super_ accurate. Scary accurate. It was like they’d met her.”

“Toph would love being compared to a dragon,” Zuko decides solemnly. “You still have to tell her I called you a rat-pig, though. I bet she’d love that too.”

“You say that like she’s not listening in to us right now with her creepy eye feet.” 

“You know that’s not how that works.” 

“You _don’t_ know that,” Sokka argues, twisting Zuko’s nipple. 

Zuko yelps, and bats at Sokka’s hand. “Hey! That’s mine!”

“Not anymore,” Sokka sings treasonously. He pulls again and Zuko makes a less upset sound this time, squirming towards him instead of away. “Neat.” 

Zuko, desperate, gasps, “You’ve only what? You said earlier, something about being your only?”

“Oh,” he says, and lets go. It’s hard to tell with all the dramatic silk canopies blocking out the light from the rest of the room, but he might be blushing. “You’re the only one who’d know what I like, y’know. Cause you’re the only one I--”

“No,” Zuko breathes, eyes wide. “You’re messing with me.” 

Sokka folds his arms over his chest petulantly. Zuko’s momentarily distracted by the dark hair dusting his chest and arms. 

“I slept with Mai and that’s why we actually broke up,” Zuko finally says. “We were really bad at it. It was bad. Really bad.”

Something in Sokka’s posture softens and Zuko goes on. “I also slept with a couple of girls on shore leave, but that didn’t go well either. Um, I ended up having to pay one.” 

That gets a laugh out of Sokka, who throws himself onto his back next to Zuko. 

“It wasn’t like, reparations, I just didn’t realize she wanted money for me to eat her out for half an hour while I tried to make my dick work? I guess she was uh...a professional.”

Sokka tweaks Zuko’s ear. “Why’d you keep tryin’ if you knew it was no good?” 

Zuko shrugs. “It’s what was expected of me. I have to marry someday. I wanted to get better. Lots of reasons.”

Sokka dodges that canon in favor of their newfound peace. 

“I got really good at giving head though,” Zuko muses. “She took off 20%.”

“Oh?” Sokka looks at him, eyebrow raised. “You know the equipments not the same.” 

Zuko rolls his eyes. “Yes, my deepest apologies for misleading you Ambassador Sokka, what I _meant_ to say is that I’m fucking _fantastic_ at eating _pussy._ ”

Sokka howls with laughter, hooting like a wolf and knuckling at Zuko’s scalp approvingly. 

“And hey,” Zuko says with a slow grin. “If I’m not good… I’ll get better.”

“You’ve proved that,” Sokka agrees, pulling the sheet over their heads and reaching for Zuko’s hips. 

“Good,” Zuko whispers. “Good.”

**Author's Note:**

> find ang3lba3 on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/cryingiscooltm)
> 
> We've started an 18+ Zukka Chaos discord! Click here [here](https://discord.gg/9qbzhcb) to join.


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